Sydney Glassman

speaker

216 appearances 2 recordings 1 series first heard Feb 2026 last heard 5 Feb

Sydney Glassman’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Feb 2026 with 2.

Appearances

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The Last Show with David Cooper · Fire-loving, Charcoal-eating Fungi · 5 Feb 2026 podcast

Fungus, you gotta love it.

So when I heard some mushrooms don't just survive wildfires, but in fact wait for them, sleeping underground, burying, and then eating charcoal, the after effects of a burn, I knew we had to learn more about it.

And that's why Sydney Glassman, a microbiology professor at the University of California, Riverside, is here to talk about fire-loving fungi.

Or is it fungi?

I don't know.

Sydney?

I like to say fungi, but either way works.

Welcome to the show also.

All right.

Thanks for having me.

Okay.

Before we get to like genes and enzymes and cells, can you paint a picture for us?

What happens to a forest right after a wildfire?

I always imagine that like the forest was ruined.

That's it.

Life ends.

I know that I'm wrong.

Okay.

Yeah.

So it depends a lot on the severity of the fire, but let's say you have a high severity stand replacing fire where all trees die.

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